Document file · Regional human-rights record

IACHR record on violence and surveillance affecting Caribbean journalists

Inter-American Commission on Human Rights · Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression

Two public records concerning the killings and displacement of journalists in Haiti and the forensic finding that Dominican investigative journalist Nuria Piera's phone was infected with Pegasus spyware.

Document of record · IACHR Special Rapporteurship · 2023

Records published 1 June and 3 October 2023

Key extracts & findings

Haiti

Journalists killed and displaced in 2023

The Rapporteurship recorded the deaths of Dumesky Kersaint, Ricot Jean and Paul Jean Marie in April and May 2023, and the displacement of about twelve journalists from Carrefour-Feuilles amid gang violence. Attribution in individual cases had not been judicially established.

State duty

Investigate, protect and prevent repetition

The IACHR called on Haiti to investigate the killings with due diligence, protect journalists at risk and address the structural violence preventing the press from working.

Dominican Republic

Pegasus infections found on Nuria Piera's phone

Amnesty International's Security Lab found forensic traces consistent with Pegasus infections on at least three occasions between 2020 and 2021. The IACHR called for a complete and impartial investigation.

Disputed

The operator remains unidentified

The Dominican State denied contracting NSO Group services after 16 August 2020. The public record did not establish who operated the spyware, and the IACHR did not attribute responsibility to a named state body.

Extracts are summarised from the document of record, which is linked above. Where a passage is disputed, this newsroom will publish the correction alongside the extract.